Recording issues

[peaks]

i am having a few issues recording my mixes
i am using ableton to record
input is digital into M-Audio sound card
from behringer DDM4000 Digital output

recording is quite distorted
i am keeping gain well out of red
not sure what going on

any one have any ideas

Thanks in advance

[Bracko]

why are you using ableton to record?

check the soundcard settings, gains could be internally ramped up to the shit... what M-Audio is it?

[peaks]

Audiophile 192
just use ableton because a copy came free with sould card

[Bracko]

what's the recording input level like on ableton? I've never recorded in ableton so you'll have to play around with it yourself.

problem is either ableton or sound card settings at a guess.... muck around with it, I'm sure you'll figure it out or learn a whole bunch of other shit in the process.

[peaks]

i did turn the gain up on the digital output from the mixer because i felt like the recording was too quiet

might try turning it down

then normalizing when i render

anyone have any ideas of better software for recording

[Bracko]

don't normalise, just increase the volume of the recording when you have finished.

normalising is possibly the worst thing you can do to a DJ mix.

audacity is a great piece of free software.

[Tripura]

normalising is possibly the worst thing you can do to a DJ mix.


I'm confused, wouldn't normalising the entire mix with a constant amount of gain to bring the peak up to the desired maximum (e.g. 0 dB) be fine?

[Bracko]

:slap::slap::slap::slap: brain snap. i shouldn't have been up that late with jetlag and a few cheeky goons under my belt.

as you were.... normalisation is fine if kept under 0db.

it retains dynamic range of the track.

[Tripura]

Is it compression that you don't like in a mix cause it messes with the range?

[DaBro]

Peaks,

I use CDJs into a Korg Zero 4 connected by firewire to my PC and i use Ableton to record.

I think i have had the same issues recording with Ableton that you describe. So much so that i actually stopped using it and tried some other programs eg Audacity.

But my onboard sound on my PC motherboard is quite shite + it was SUCH a waste to have a killer ASIO soundcard (in the form of my mixer) with a digital connection to my PC and not use it!

So I ended up coming back to Ableton and i think i have it sorted now.

The problem i had was my end product, rendered mixes, were of really crappy quality. They sounded like a radio that wasn't quite tuned in properly to a station.

What I ended up doing was cranking up to maximum the sample rate in the audio preferences in Ableton. Then when the mix is done and its time to render, I also cranked up to max the rendering settings.

Now this produces a MASSIVE wav file but you can cut it down to something more manageable (eg 320kbps mp3) by using a free file converter after you render it.

The result is really nice sound.

Hope this helps.

[peaks]

Thanks mate i will give that a go
unfortunatly because i only have the lite vesion of ableton i can only render files under a certain size which normaly means i have to reduce the sample rate.

that said, its actually distortion before i render
ie playing back recording in ableton
that is more concerning

did you have to crank the gain on your Korg to get a decent recording level?
that may be the problem i am having as i have to crank the spdif output gain on my mixer to get a decent level into ableton

[DaBro]

Thanks mate i will give that a go
unfortunatly because i only have the lite vesion of ableton i can only render files under a certain size which normaly means i have to reduce the sample rate.

that said, its actually distortion before i render
ie playing back recording in ableton
that is more concerning

did you have to crank the gain on your Korg to get a decent recording level?
that may be the problem i am having as i have to crank the spdif output gain on my mixer to get a decent level into ableton


Yeah even the full version of Ableton likes to only render below a certain size too. But thats not really a drama, instead of reducing you quality just cut your mix in two parts. Go to session view (i think thats what its called, the one with the whole track laid out horizontally), drop a marker in the centre of your mix, go to edit cut, then render it in two parts. Or better still - cut at each track and render & save each track seperately. Then burn them all (in order!) on a CD, then the mates you are trying to impress can skip fwd/back etc in your mix :thumb:

If you’re getting distortion before rendering that would mean either your mixer is not enjoying the red-lining or the audio imput sample rates (see preferences audio) are too low. Should be easy to tell, what speakers are you listening to while you mix? If you hook them up to booth output you will be able to hear if there’s distortion pre-ableton.

Ableton’s does have a lowish recording level for inputs. But I don’t have to do anything silly with the gains to get an okay level, I just up the master-out a bit more. If that doesn’t work suggest normalizing at render stage as someone above suggested. That should work.

[WADZA]

Go to session view (i think thats what its called, the one with the whole track laid out horizontally)

it's arrangement view